“You know, the devil stole your baby!?” said the woman in the hall of the church that I was visiting after the death of my son Robby. I hadn’t attended a church service in about 7 years, except visiting the church that my parents attended on a few occasions.
Steve and I had even dedicated Robby to the Lord at that church after he was released from the NICU a couple of years earlier, but I was still angry and bitter towards “church people” after what had happened to me in high school, and now here I was with more “church people”, trying once again to find comfort in my suffering, and this was the “comfort” that was being offered to me?
I bowed up and said to her “I don’t know what God you serve but the devil never touched my child! God said ‘well done good and faithful servant, come walk with me.’ He sent His son Jesus to take the keys of death and hell and my son was healed the day that he died!” Then I left that Church, never to return.
I had never left my faith but I was angry with the “bad doctrine” that I had heard through many of the churches that I had attended in my youth, and many of the people that used those doctrines in ways that wounded the people that I knew my Heavenly Father loved, and had called me to love.
My faith and my understanding of His teachings had actually grown much stronger when Robby was alive, and I wasn’t in a church. In my suffering I had pressed into my Father’s love and I studied these doctrines that I was now questioning. The things that were taught to me in my childhood, as absolute truths, were now giant questions with gaping holes in them.
It’s obvious now that I came to a place of forgiveness for the people in the church, even becoming ordained myself in order to do chaplaincy work. Forgiveness is a whole other book of teachings, in and of itself though!
Now I’m thankful for that time away from the “church people“ though, because we don’t get answers to questions unless we’re in a place to ask them, yet it was very painful at the time.
The prosperity doctrine was one of the most devastating and wounding teachings for me, and from what I was learning in my own studies and life experiences, it was a lie! Often it was used by conmen posing as pastors in order to bilk their congregations, but it left behind a multitude of wounded people, who often turned from their faith.
I’m so thankful that even at 23, my personal faith was strong enough, and my personality was stubborn enough, to be able to separate the people from my faith, but many aren’t so blessed.
We can’t always know why we are allowed to go through these things but we can know that our Father knows why and He loves us! We also know that the Bible tells us in John 16:33 that “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
One scripture that I clung to in my own suffering was Romans 5: 3-4 says “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”
Most people that I’ve met in my life who have little character, or are what I would consider “shallow”, have never experienced real suffering. If they’ve lived their faith by believing that they’ve been blessed because they’ve been “good enough”, when tribulations do come to their lives, they will have a crisis of faith too.
I don’t understand how people can get trapped in the “name it and claim it, blab it and grab it” doctrine but it’s a lie from the devil! The first time one of them has suffering, they will likely feel tremendous guilt, fear and shame because they’ve been taught that if they have enough faith, they shouldn’t have this happen.
They also may become angry and confused, asking themselves “What did I do to deserve this?” Then they often lose their faith. The fact is that He carries us through the tribulations if we let Him, sometimes one minute at a time, and THAT’S where true faith grows!
Sometimes people would ask Steve and me if we had ever questioned God with the “Why me?” question. Steve’s answer was perfect. He would say “Why NOT me?” “What makes me think that I’m so special or entitled that the troubles in this life would just pass me by?”
God spoke to my heart one day and said “I know that you have faith that I can heal, but do you have faith when I chose not to?” God can do ALL things but our physical life, death and prosperity are of no consequence to Him, other than how they will effect our spiritual life, death and prosperity! Sometimes our suffering allows greater growth and prosperity than if He was a genie in the sky granting our wishes! He’s our Loving Heavenly Father who takes us from ”glory to glory”.
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